Indie author Marie Force debuts on the NY Times e-book bestseller list on 10 March at #6 and the combined print/e-book list at #11 with her indie-published book, “Waiting for Love,” book 8 in her popular McCarthys of Gansett Island Series.

She is the best-selling, award-winning author of 25 contemporary romances, including The McCarthy Series, the Fatal Series with Harlequin, the Treading Water Series and numerous stand-alone books. Her new series, The Green Mountain Series, is coming from Berkley in early 2014.

You sold your first book to a traditional publisher in 2007. Less than six years later, you’re one of the bestselling authors in romance. What do you think is the single most important key to your success?

Self-publishing is the single most important key to my success. The ability to release books frequently has helped to raise my profile with readers in a way that never would’ve happened without direct publishing access to Kindle, Nook, iBookstore and Kobo, in particular. I also credit Facebook with giving me a daily conduit to readers who have supported me throughout my career and continue to do so today.

You’ve said that “No one was interested in these books except my readers,” regarding some of your titles. Is that what led you to self-publish?

Yes, exactly! One of my favorite stories involves the Big Six house that rejected my book “True North,” with the reasoning, “No one wants to read about a super model.” Those eight words changed my life profoundly. They were the catalyst that drove me to try something new. “True North,” the story of an unlucky-in-love super model who finds love on a two-week vacation in her small Rhode Island hometown, was the first book I self-published. Since it went on sale in November of 2010, it has sold more than 50,000 units. I guess a few people want to read about a super model…

Would you ever go back to traditional publishing completely?

Barring major changes in the programs offered by participating retailers, I can’t imagine any scenario in which self-publishing is not a part of my overall picture.

How do you handle the workload of not only writing the books, but all the other aspects of being incredibly successful in indie-publishing?

The workload is a bit staggering. I won’t deny that. I work seven days a week, three hundred sixty-five days a year. A day “off” usually consists of three or four hours of work in the morning, followed by household stuff that gets neglected while books are being written and published. I’m in the midst of the most intense writing cycle of my career right now, with a Fatal book due to Harlequin March 15, two books due to Berkley before August 1, and another McCarthy book promised to readers, hopefully by the end of the summer. I’ve also got readers clamoring for a fifth book in my Treading Water Series, which is a very nice “problem” to have, but there’s just no wiggle room in the schedule this year. “Treading Water,” book 1 in that series, was my first book and is very close to my heart because it started everything. I find it funny that I’ve reached a point in my career where writing a new book in that very beloved series is just not possible at this time. Back in the day, that scenario would’ve been unimaginable to me.

Getting back to your juggling question, I hired a full-time assistant in January, and she has saved my life. I also have a part-time employee, who helps primarily with my e-Book Formatting Fairies business. We format and prepare books for other authors pursuing self-publication. So we’re busy, but it’s the best kind of busy.

When did your career begin to take off? What do you attribute your success to?

My career got a nice boost from a freebie offered by my first publisher in February of 2011, and I’ve been on a roll ever since then. Releasing the first three McCarthy books, “Maid for Love,” “Fool for Love” and “Ready for Love” in April, May and June of 2011 also helped to give me a big boost. I had four more McCarthy books out in 2012 and offered book 1, “Maid for Love,” as a freebie for the last half of 2012. I had more than 500,000 downloads of that freebie and hundreds of thousands of sales of the subsequent books in the series. “Waiting for Love,” book 8 in the McCarthy Series, is the one that just hit all the major bestseller lists in February. It was a slow build that finally paid off in a big way. I now have 16 self-published books and nine traditionally published books, with more of both coming. Without a doubt, free books have changed the game for me numerous times and contributed greatly to discoverability with digital readers.

How do you think your readers found you?

It was a combination of things. As I said, free books helped enormously. I’m also very visible on Facebook and run about 30 reader groups—one for each series, one for each book and an overall Marie Force Book Talk group, all of which are very popular with readers. The McCarthy Reader Group just welcomed its 5,000th member, which was another amazing milestone in a month full of them. The readers who hang out with me on Facebook are great about spreading the word about my books to their friends and families, which has also helped the cause. I push my mailing list at every possible opportunity and have seen that grow by many thousands in the last year. Finally, I make an effort—with the help of my assistant—to make sure that every reader who writes to me gets a reply. As time has gone on, this has become increasingly time consuming, but it’s a very important part of what we do every day. Readers are everything, and we never forget that for a second.

You recently just hit the NY Times list. What did you do to achieve this goal and how do you feel about it?

Yes! My first time on the New York Times list! What a thrill! I tend to be low-key about things that other authors get very excited about, such as contests and the like. I always thought if or when I ever hit the Times list, I’d check that box and move on with my life. Well, it didn’t happen quite that way… Turns out, it was a VERY exciting day! The book sold astonishingly well the first week, so I suspected it might hit the extended list, which would’ve been lovely. But to see it at no. 6 for ebooks and no. 11 on the combined print/ebook list was way beyond thrilling. Then to score no. 15 on the USA Today list and no. 6 on the Wall Street Journal ebook list was triply exciting. In the last two weeks, I’ve learned that “New York Times Bestseller” are words everyone understands, whether they are in our business or not. One of the things that was instrumental to making the list was being allowed to offer “Waiting for Love” for pre-order at several of the major retailers, who are beginning to allow a few indie authors that privilege. And it is, indeed, a privilege that they trust me enough after 16 indie books to know I will deliver the book as promised, on schedule with no drama. Those advance sales truly made the difference in hitting the bestseller lists, and I’m grateful to my retail partners for making that opportunity available to me. It was also a huge thrill to share the bestseller moment with my husband and kids as well as my widowed dad, who was almost as excited as I was. That was a very happy moment in what’s become a lovely career.

We noticed you were added to the RWA honor roll with a self-published title. What does this mean to you? Have you entered the RITAs?

Well, to be honest, the RWA Honor Roll status would mean a lot more to me if I were allowed to enter my bestselling book in RWA’s RITA contest for published authors. As it stands right now, the RITA is not open to self-published books, but I hope to see those rules changed before too much longer. Although I’ve never been validated by contests, I don’t like being told I can’t enter my book in a contest because of the way it was brought to market, especially when it has done so well. There’s something offensive about that, and I know I’m not alone in feeling excluded from one of my professional organization’s premier programs. I’m hoping that with several prominent self-published authors in leadership positions on the RWA board this year that we might start to see some of those final barriers to participation crumble. Self-publishing is here to stay, and I believe it won’t be long before more authors are self-publishing than are pursuing the traditional path. Yes, I have entered books in the RITA in the past, and have two Fatal books in the contest this year.

What top three things do you view as critical to success as an author with the publishing landscape changing so quickly?

Job one in my world is quality. Every one of my books undergoes rigorous beta reading, copy editing and proofreading as well as other quality control steps. My covers are professionally designed, and my ebooks are interactive with live links to purchase other books that are customized to each individual retail platform. We also produce print versions for each of my books via CreateSpace, and they are popular with readers who still prefer print. We’re now bringing all my self-published books out in audio format, too. A lot of steps are involved with professional self-publishing, and no corners are ever cut.

Job two is quantity. The authors who seem to be doing the best in the digital space have one big thing in common—we’re all prolific. We produce numerous high-quality books each year, and we keep readers happy because they don’t have to wait six months or a year for our next book. With so many things competing for consumer attention, keeping the product coming is critically important to building—and keeping—a readership.

Third would be listening to readers and giving them what they want. My readers are very vocal about what they like and don’t like in my books. Fortunately, there is more of the former than the latter! LOL! They desperately wanted resolution of a story begun in “Marking Time,” Treading Water Series book 2, which led me to write, “Coming Home,” book 4 in that series. “Coming Home,” released on 12.12.12., has done very well and has made them happy, which is so important to me. I’m thankful for every one of them, and I try to show them that in every way I can. They’ve also given me some damned good ideas. I plan to write a special Gansett Island book called, “Gansett After Dark,” based on a suggestion a reader made months ago. It was a brilliant idea, and I’m looking forward to writing that book.

If you’ve done so well as an indie author, why continue to go the “hybrid” route with traditional publishers?

For one thing, I was with Harlequin’s Carina Press for my Fatal Series before I began self-publishing, so it made sense to continue the series where it began. Harlequin will begin publishing the Fatal books in mass-market paperback under the HQN imprint later this year. Since a big portion of romance readers are still interested in paperbacks, I was anxious to get back into print and to have wide distribution for the first time in my career. Harlequin has worked really hard on the Fatal Series (and given me some awesome covers!), so I’m enjoying my stay with them. Berkley provided an opportunity to put a contemporary series into mass market print in addition to ebooks, which was part of an overall strategy to make sure I’m hitting all the available markets—ebook, print, audio, etc. My agent, Kevan Lyon, has been very supportive of my self-publishing pursuits and has worked closely with me to make sure I’m moving in the right direction on all these fronts. At this point, everything is an experiment, and I’m willing to try a number of different strategies to see what works best.

Are you having fun yet?

I’m having fun every day, and I’m just getting started. This is the best time EVER to be an author, and I couldn’t be more excited about the future!

If your goal is to take the traditional publishing route then yes, you should be seeking an agent. Let me do clarify one thing though….if you are submitting to indie publishing houses then no, most will accept manuscripts straight from the author however if you are looking at large conglomerates then yes, you need to find an agent. Most of these will only accept submissions from agents.

Word to the wise…there is no formal education that a person must obtain in order to call themselves an agent. In other words, just ensure you use caution and do some serious research before reaching out. You want to find someone that not only knows the industry inside and out, but someone who has some serious ties to the publishing industry.

Finish writing your novel before contacting literary agents. Have other writers read your book, take a novel writing class, or hire an editor. We all have blind spots as writers; identify them before contacting any agents with your novel. And make sure that the first 30 pages or so are especially strong. Agents need to see that you can set up your story effectively.

2. Establish Credibility.

An agent will be more likely to pay attention to your work if you have published in smaller journals and magazines. Find an excerpt from your book that can stand alone and begin sending it out. (Other ways of establishing yourself as a serious writer include winning a contest or getting an MFA.)

Your query letter is your one-page audition: your chance to catch an agent’s eye. Introduce your novel with a short, compelling synopsis, then share the credentials you’ve been working so hard to accumulate. These dos and don’ts will further help you craft a professional, dynamic letter.

5. Start Writing Literary Agents.

Once you’ve finished your novel and researched the market, you’re ready to start querying literary agents. Dive in and see what happens. Even if you don’t land an agent right away, hopefully you’ll get feedback, both about your writing and about where it might belong.

As you proceed, questions will inevitably come up: What fees should you expect? Can you send to more than one at a time? What if you have more than one book? For answers, refer to the agent FAQs. You can also follow one writer’s path to finding an agent.

1. Blogs. This is one of my favorites, of course. Aside from this blog, there are dozens of great blogs on writing and every topic under the sun. I like to read about what works for others — it inspires me to action!

2. Books. Maybe my favorite overall. I read writers I love (read about my current loves) and then I steal from them, analyze their writing, get inspired by their greatness. Fiction is my favorite, but I’ll devour anything. If you normally read just a couple of your favorite authors, try branching out into something different. You just might find new inspiration.

3. Overheard dialog. If I’m anywhere public, whether it be at a park or a mall or my workplace, sometimes I’ll eavesdrop on people. Not in a gross way or anything, but I’ll just keep quiet, and listen. I love hearing other people have conversations. Sometimes it doesn’t happen on purpose — you can’t help but overhear people sometimes. If you happen to overhear a snippet of interesting dialog, jot it down in your writing journal as soon as possible. It can serve as a model or inspiration for later writing.

4. Magazines. Good magazines aren’t always filled with great writing, but you can usually find one good piece of either fiction or non-fiction. Good for its writing style, its voice, its rhythm and ability to pull you along to the end. These pieces inspire me. And bad magazines, while perhaps not the best models for writing, can still be inspirations for ideas for good blog posts. These magazines, as they don’t draw readers with great writing, find interesting story angles to attract an audience.

5. Movies. Sometimes, while watching a movie, a character will say something so interesting that I’ll say, “That would make a great blog post!” or “I have to write that in my writing journal!” Sometimes screenwriters can write beautiful dialog. Other times I get inspired by the incredible camera work, the way that a face is framed by the camera, the beauty of the landscape captured on film.

6. Forums. When people write on forums, they rarely do so for style or beauty (there are exceptions, of course, but they’re rare). Forumers are writing to convey information and ideas. Still, those ideas can be beautiful and inspiring in and of themselves. They can inspire more ideas in you. I’m not saying you have to read a wide array of forums every day, but if you’re looking for information, trawling some good forums isn’t a bad idea.

7. Art. For the writer aspiring to greater heights, there is no better inspiration that great art, in my experience. While it doesn’t compare to the experience of seeing the art in person, I like to find inspiring works of art and put it on my computer desktop for contemplation (Michelangelo’s Pieta is there right now). It doesn’t have to be classical works, though — I’ve found inspiration in Japanese anime, in stuff I’ve found on deviantart.com, in local artists in my area.

8. Music. Along the same lines, it can be inspiring to download and play great music, from Mozart to Beethoven to the Beatles to Radiohead. Play it in the background as you write, and allow it to lift you up and move you.

9. Friends. Conversations with my friends, in real life, on the phone or via IM, have inspired some of my best posts. They stir up my ideas, contribute ideas of their own, and they fuse into something even more brilliant than either of us could have created.

10. Writing groups. Whether online or in your community, writing groups are great ways to get energy and motivation for your writing. My best short stories were done in a writing group in my local college (a great place to look for such groups, btw), as we read out our work to the group, critiqued them and made suggestions. The work of the other writers inspired me to do better.

11. The Pocket Muse . A book full of writing inspirations. Can’t beat that!

12. Quotes. I don’t know why it’s so, but great quotes help inspire me. I like to go to various quote sites to find ideas to spark my writing, turns of phrase that show what can be done with the language, motivation for self-improvement. Try these for a start: Writing Quotes and Quotes for Writers.

13. Nature. Stuck for ideas? Go for a walk or a jog. Get away from sidewalks and into grass and trees and fields and hills. Appreciate the beauty around you, and let the inspiration flow through you. Sunsets and sunrises, of course, are two of my favorite uplifting scenes of nature, and anything involving water is also awesome (oceans, rivers, lakes, rain, rivulets, even puddles).

14. History. It can be unexpected, but great people in history can inspire you to greatness. My favorites include Benjamin Franklin, Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Helen Keller, Leonardo da Vinci, and other greats.

15. Travel. Whether it be halfway around the world, or a day trip to the next town or national park, getting out of your usual area and discovering new places and people and customs can be one of the best inspirations for writing. Use these new places to open up new ways of seeing.

16. Children. I have six kids, and they are my favorite people in the world (my wife and siblings and parents being right up there too). I love to spend quiet time with them, taking walks or reading. I love to have fun with them, playing board games or having pillow fights. And during these times I spend with them, I’m often reflective, about life, about humanity, about love. I suggest that children, with their fresh outlook on the world, can change the way you view things.

17. Exercise. I get my best ideas most often while running. There’s something about the quietness, combined with the increased flow of blood through your brain, combined with being out in the fresh air with nature, that really stimulates the mind.

18. Religion. Many of you aren’t religious (and many are) but it doesn’t matter much — the great religions in the world have ideas in them that are beautiful and inspiring. I’ve studied some of the writings of not only Christianity and Judaism but Islam, Bahai’i, Buddhism, Taoism, and many cultures with multiple nature gods. I can’t say I’m an expert at any of these religions, but I can say that any time I’ve spent reading the ideas of religion have paid off for me in inspiration.

19. Newspapers. I used to be a newspaper reporter and editor, and I’ve become jaded to newspapers. The news seems like an endless cycle of the same thing, happening over and over again. However, if you know how to look, you can find human-interest stories that are inspiring. Stories about people who have triumphed over adversity. (Edit: I had “diversity” instead of “adversity” here and have now corrected … thanks for the catch, Bill!)

20. Dreams. I’m not very good at this, but at times in my life I’ve tried keeping a dream journal by my bedside and writing down what I can remember when I wake up. Not because I think it’ll tell me something about myself or my future or past, but because dreams are so interesting in their complete disregard for the rules of reality, for their otherworldness and plot twists.

21. Writing journal. I highly recommend this for any writer. It doesn’t have to be fancy, or something you write in every day. Just a plain notebook will do, although a nice journal can be motivating. Write down thoughts and inspirations and quotes and snippets of good writing you find and pieces of dialog and plot ideas and new characters. Then go back to this journal when you need ideas or inspiration.

22. Del.icio.us. This popular bookmarking site is a treasure trove of great articles and blog posts and resources. I don’t do this much, but sometimes I’ll browse through these links to find examples of great writing by others. While you shouldn’t steal these ideas, you can often adapt them to your particular blog topic, or use the ideas to spark new ones of your own.

23. Poetry. How can poetry inspire prose? Through its beauty and flow and style and use of rhythm and play on words. Through its use of language and music.

24. Shakespeare. He’s not the only playwright, of course, but he’s undoubtedly the greatest, and the greatest master of the English language as well. While his writing can be difficult for those not used to the language of his time, a study of even one of his plays pays off immensely. The Bard wrote beautifully, used the largest vocabulary of any English writer, invented his own words, made up interesting phrases that are used to this day, had more puns and twists of words than any writer I know. There is no writer more deserving of our study and more inspirational to other writers.

25. Google. Stuck for ideas? The old standby, Google, has often helped me out. I’ll just search for the topic I’m writing about and find tons of great resources. (Evin adds…just remember plagarism. Quote your sources!)

26. Freewriting. One of the best ways to get unstuck if you’re uninspired. Just start writing. Anything. It doesn’t matter. Don’t edit, don’t pause, don’t think. Just write and let it flow. You’ll end up with a lot of garbage, probably, but it’ll help you get out of your rut and you might just write some really good stuff among all that garbage.

27. Brainstorms. Similar to freewriting, but instead of writing prose you’re writing ideas. Just let them flow. Speed and quantity is more important than quality. Within this brainstorm of ideas, you’ll most likely find a few nuggets of greatness. One of my favorite ways to get ideas.

28. Flickr. If fine paintings and sculpture inspire you to greater heights, photography of some of the most talented people in the world can show what everyday humans can do if they try. I like Flickr.com, a real wealthy of amazing photography. Just browse through to find some wonderful inspiration.

29. Breaking your routines. Get out of your rut to see things from a new perspective. If you usually take one route to work, try a couple others. If you usually get up, get ready for work, and leave, try exercising in the morning or watching the sunrise. If you usually watch TV at the end of the day, try reading or writing instead. Shake things up.

30. Success stories. Another of my favorites. When I was training for my first marathon, for example, I read all kinds of success stories of people who had run their first marathon. It inspired me to keep going. There are success stories for writing, or anything else you’d like to do, that will inspire your brains out.

31. People watching. This is an interesting activity for any writer. Go to a busy public place and just sit and watch people. They’ll amuse you, inspire you, and fascinate you. There’s nothing more inspiring than humanity.

It really is a process. First the writing, then onto the publishing. My wife recently started a local women’s book club. Her first one was a huge success. She found out that the author of the club’s first read is actually local to us, contacted her and was able to have her attend their first meeting.

She’s traditionally published 10 books I believe. I’m envious that I wasn’t able to attend because she took the group through the entire writing and publishing process.

For instance, she is currently working on a new book. The main character in this book works a trade in which the author really doesn’t know much about. To learn about the trade, she spent a day with an expert and learned enough, enabling her to write about knowledgably the subject.

I’m sure there was more, but that’s what I learned second hand from my wife. J

The publishing process is really what intrigued me the most. First, the author reads back over her manuscript 8 times before she sends it to the publisher. Yes, 8 times. Once she’s satisfied, off it goes. It’s first sent to someone that checks over her facts, to ensure accuracy. Okay, I must admit that this is something I’ve never thought about with the traditional publishing process however it does make sense.

Once the accuracy of actual facts is verified, it’s passed on to the editor and so forth.

Suffice it to say that I wish I could have spoken directly to the author myself. In fact, I’m thinking about trying to find out if I can score an interview with her, so you just might actually be reading one soon; one that I’ve conducted myself.

Another thing that can be said for this is to realize that although this author is traditionally published, she is marketing. My wife said she spoke off and on about her latest book that is soon to be released. Let’s also realize that she attended my wife’s book club. Goes to show that regardless as to whether or not an author is traditionally or self-published, that marketing is a must.

Okay, so no new great words of wisdom in this post. I wish I could tell you more about the process, but I’ve shared what I’ve learned and hey, maybe I’ll find out more from the author soon!

Happy Monday! Regarding the title of today’s post…how many of you thought that I actually interviewed Dean Koontz? Let’s see a raise of hands. Just kidding but, I do wish I had been the one to conduct the interview however I’m not quite that famous or well known in the industry. Not yet. So in the meantime, I have found an interview for you to enjoy. I think we can learn a lot from famous authors and how they got their starts. Taken straight from http://www.deankoontz.com/writing-qa/:

You had an agent in your early years tell you that you’d never be a best-selling writer. Did that discourage you or make you more determined to succeed?

I have more self-doubt than any writer I’ve ever known. That is one reason I revise every page to the point of absurdity! The positive aspect of self-doubt – if you can channel it into useful activity instead of being paralyzed by it – is that by the time you reach the end of a novel, you know precisely why you made every decision in the narrative, the multiple purposes of every metaphor and image. Having been your own hardest critic you still have dreams but not illusions. Consequently, thoughtless criticism or advice can’t long derail you. You become disappointed in an agent, in an editor, in a publisher, but never discouraged. If anyone in your publishing life were to argue against a particular book or a career aspiration for reasons you had not already pondered and rejected after careful analysis, if they dazzled you with brilliant new considerations, then you’d have to back off and revisit your decisions. But what I was told never dazzled me. For example, I was often advised, by different people, that my work would never gain a big audience because my vocabulary was too large.

It’s been said that writers reveal their own struggles, fears, dreams, etc. through their work. Which of your novels reveals the most about you?

Everything I believe about life and death, culture and society, relationships and the self, God and nature–everything winds up in the books, not in one more than another, but equally, title after title. A body of work, therefore, reveals the intellectual and emotional progress of the writer, and is a map of his soul. It’s both terrifying and liberating to consider this aspect of being a novelist.

I’ve read that you will rewrite a page until it’s right before moving on, sometimes redoing a draft thirty or forty times. This must make for a slow process. Approximately how long does it take you to write one novel?

I work 10- and 11-hour days because in long sessions I fall away more completely into story and characters than I would in, say, a six-hour day. On good days, I might wind up with five or six pages of finished work; on bad days, a third of a page. Even five or six is not a high rate of production for a 10- or 11-hour day, but there are more good days than bad. And the secret is doing it day after day, committing to it and avoiding distractions. A month–perhaps 22 to 25 work days–goes by and, as a slow drip of water can fill a huge cauldron in a month, so you discover that you have 75 polished pages. The process is slow, but that’s a good thing. Because I don’t do a quick first draft and then revise it, I have plenty of time to let the subconscious work; therefore, I am led to surprise after surprise that enriches story and deepens character. I have a low boredom threshold, and in part I suspect I fell into this method of working in order to keep myself mystified about the direction of the piece–and therefore entertained. A very long novel, like FROM THE CORNER OF HIS EYE can take a year. A book like THE GOOD GUY, six months.

You are one of the most prolific fiction writers of our time. What keeps you going?

In addition to the enchantment with language and storytelling, there is the fact that I wouldn’t know what the hell to do if I were not doing this. Some leisure is fine, but not an unrelieved diet of downtime. I’m also writing to ensure that our foundation–which focuses largely on organizations for the severely disabled, critically ill children, and dogs–will be deeply funded and able to support those organizations long after Gerda and I are gone.

You are known as perhaps the hardest working novelist of our time. To what do you attribute your work ethic?

Two things. First, I am enchanted by the English language, by its beauty and flexibility, also by the power of storytelling to expand the mind and lift the heart. Language and story offer possibilities –intriguing challenges–that I couldn’t exhaust in many lifetimes. The work is joy when it’s going well, even when it isn’t. Second, I believe that talent is a gift and that it comes with the sacred obligation to polish and grow it.

As a young writer, did you encounter rejection?–Allison, Pennsylvania

I sold the first short story I wrote. Then I received over 75 rejections before making another sale. My first four novels were never published. Later, after I’d been selling genre fiction routinely, I wrote a mainstream novel, ALL OTHER MEN. Editors sent me enthusiastic letters about it, said they loved it, but turned it down because they felt it was too disturbing and too avant garde to be commercial. But let me get to the heart of your question: young writer. There seems to be an implication here that I’m no longer young. I am as young now, Allison, as I have ever been, and not because of any form of dementia. I am young because my work keeps me young and the daily wrestling with our beautiful and supple language keeps me limber and youthful, as well. You may think that is bullshit, and it is, but it’s a sincere kind of bullshit.

How important were college creative-writing courses to your success?—Alberto, Washington

I’m sure that the right teacher, in a well-designed course, can be a great help to beginning writers who are trying to find their way, but I have no personal experience of that. I found my own way by doing two things. First, I read 150 books a year, sometimes more, (very little TV, later no blogging, no e-mail, that’s how), fiction in all genres, contemporary novels but also the classics, poetry, and a variety of nonfiction. Second, I revise every page of a novel twenty or thirty times, whatever it takes, before moving on to the next page. This line-by-line immersion focuses me intently on language, character, and theme. I began this ceaseless polishing out of self-doubt, as a way of preventing self-doubt from turning into writer’s block: by doing something with the unsatisfactory page, I wasn’t just sitting there brooding about it. I have more self-doubt than any writer I know, which seems healthy to me, and now this method of working, this line-by-line immersion, no longer seems arduous; instead, it delights me. While my conscious mind is on the micro world of a single page, my unconscious is always working on the macro world of the entire novel.

When did you decide you were destined to be a writer? At what point in your life? —Marcy, New Jersey

Deliverance is a historical romance set in Canada in 1917. It’s a sequel to the Author’s 2011 release, Shattered. The hero is a returned WW1 veteran who has gone AWOL to avoid being sent back overseas, and the heroine is a returned Red Cross nurse.

About the Book
Autumn 1917

Carl O’Neill is on the run from the Army and himself. Returned from Europe on recuperative leave, he’d rather die than go back to the trenches. He assumes a dead man’s name and leaves his home and family behind him, only to be dumped off the train in the small prairie town of Mackenzie, Saskatchewan. Seriously ill and stranded, Carl has no choice but to confront the demons that drive him – and his growing feelings for the former Red Cross nurse who saves his life.

Naomi Franklin is no stranger to secrets and personal demons. Struggling with the trauma of rape and her experiences in a front-line field hospital, Naomi can’t bear to close the eyes of another young man whose life has ended far too soon. She’ll nurse the stranger who lands on her father’s doorstep and then send him on his way. But looking into Carl’s blue eyes makes her feel like a woman again, while the all-too-familiar shadows behind them touch her heart. When both their lives come crashing down around them, can Carl and Naomi overcome secrets and lies to find each other again?

About the Author
Jennie Marsland is a teacher, a painter, a musician and, for most of her life, a writer. She fell in love with words at a very early age and the affair has been life-long. She enjoys writing songs and poetry as well as fiction.

Jennie is a history buff as well as an unashamed romantic. Glimpses of the past spark her imagination, and she believes in happily ever after.

A resident of Halifax, Nova Scotia for the last thirty years, she lives with her husband Everett and their outrageously spoiled Duck-Tolling Retrievers, Chance and Echo.

When the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and author David Mamet released his last book, “The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture,” with the Sentinel publishing house in 2011, it sold well enough to make the New York Times best-seller list.

Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and author David Mamet is planning to self-publish his next work.
This year, when Mr. Mamet set out to publish his next one, a novella and two short stories about war, he decided to take a very different path: he will self-publish.

Mr. Mamet is taking advantage of a new service being offered by his literary agency, ICM Partners, as a way to assume more control over the way his book is promoted.

“Basically I am doing this because I am a curmudgeon,” Mr. Mamet said in a telephone interview, “and because publishing is like Hollywood — nobody ever does the marketing they promise.”

As digital disruption continues to reshape the publishing market, self-publishing — including distribution digitally or as print on demand — has become more and more popular, and more feasible, with an increasing array of options for anyone with an idea and a keyboard. Most of the attention so far has focused on unknown and unsigned authors who storm onto the best-seller lists through their own ingenuity.

The announcement by ICM and Mr. Mamet suggests that self-publishing will begin to widen its net and become attractive also to more established authors. For one thing, as traditional publishers have cut back on marketing, this route allows well-known figures like Mr. Mamet to look after their own publicity.

Then there is the money. While self-published authors get no advance, they typically receive 70 percent of sales. A standard contract with a traditional house gives an author an advance, and only pays royalties — the standard is 25 percent of digital sales and 7 to 12 percent of the list price for bound books — after the advance is earned back in sales.

ICM, which will announce its new self-publishing service on Wednesday, is one of the biggest and most powerful agencies to offer the option. But others are doing the same as they seek to provide additional value to their writers while also extending their reach in the industry.

Since last fall, Trident Media Group, which represents 800 authors, has been offering its clients self-publishing possibilities through deals negotiated though online publishers like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, in a system very similar to the one ICM is setting up. Robert Gottlieb, chairman of Trident, says that 200 authors have taken advantage of the service, though mostly for reissuing older titles, the backlist.

Another literary agency, InkWell Management, has helped the romance novelist Eloisa James reissue many of her backlist titles, as well as her newer books overseas, this way. She usually turns out her best sellers through HarperCollins, and in a telephone interview she said she would not leave Harper completely because she loves her editor. But she added that published authors talked about the “self-pubs” all the time and had learned a lot from those writers’ efforts.

“They treat it like a small business,” she said, “and they are geniuses at discoverability.”

Sloan Harris, co-director of ICM’s literary department, said his agency signed a deal with a company called Argo Navis Author Services, a self-publishing service created by the Perseus Book Group, because he decided it was time to give his clients more options than the standard big publishing houses.

For certain clients, Mr. Harris said, self-publishing “returns a degree of control to authors who have been frustrated about how their ideas for marketing and publicity fare at traditional publishers.” Both Mr. Harris and Mr. Mamet said that the big publishers focused mostly on blockbuster books and fell short on other titles — by publishing too few copies, for instance, or limiting advertising to only a short period after a book was released.

“Particularly for high-end literary fiction, their efforts too often have been very low-octane,” Mr. Harris said of the traditional publishers.

Although Mr. Mamet will be the best known of the agency’s clients to use the new service, he is not the only one: two older books by ICM clients that have gone to backlist, “Searching for Bobby Fischer,” by Fred Waitzkin, and “Ghosts of Mississippi,” by Maryanne Vollers, will also be reissued this way.

And Mr. Harris said more would come. “We will pay ever more attention project by project, author by author, as to what our options are,” he said.

If an author self-publishes, what, then, is the role of a literary agency? Mr. Gottlieb of Trident said it made sense for his clients to self-publish through the agency, which charges a standard commission on sales, instead of going directly to Amazon themselves because the agency brought experience in marketing and jacket design. It also has relationships with the digital publishers that give their clients access to plum placement on sites that self-published authors can’t obtain on their own.